Deborah Gibson-Westbrook

02/11/2025

02/10/2025

Feb 28 boycott my black and Latino fam! Dont spend your money 💵! People of color join us and our white allies! Freeze 🥶 your spending one day! Show them we mean business!

02/07/2025

02/06/2025

Paradise Funeral Home Celebrates the Life of MRS. EVELYN DELORES NUTE
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God hath not promised skies always blue, Flower-strewn pathways all our lives through, God hath not promised sun without rain, joy without sorrow, peace without pain.
But God hath promised strength for the day, Rest for the labor, light for the way, Grace for the trials, help from above, Unfailing sympathy, and undying love.
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On behalf of Ronald B. Washington and the entire Paradise Funeral Home Family, we extend our deepest condolences to
THE NUTE FAMILY and we thank you for entrusting us with your loved one. May the blessings of the Lord keep you is our prayer.

02/05/2025

Fritz Pollard was born in January 1894. He was a Black American football player and coach in the National Football League.Frederick Douglas "Fritz" Pollard grew up in Chicago. By the time he graduated from high school, he was a talented baseball player, running back and a three-time Cook County track champion. He briefly played football for Northwestern, Harvard and Dartmouth before receiving a scholarship from the Rockefeller family to attend Brown University in 1915.It was here where Pollard led their squad to a 1916 Rose Bowl game. He was the first African American to play in the Rose bowl, and the second to be named an All-American in college football. After leaving Brown, Pollard briefly pursued a degree in dentistry, worked as director of an army YMCA, and coached football at Lincoln University. He signed to play for the Akron Pros in the American Professional Football League (APFA).Pollard lead Akron to a championship in 1920, was named head coach in 1921 and continued to play for the Pros as well. The APFA was renamed the NFL in 1922, making Pollard the first African American coach in NFL history. Pollard coached Akron until 1926, and went on to coach NFL teams in Indiana and Milwaukee. He retired from football in 1937 to pursue a career in business, remaining the only Black to have coached in the NFL until the 1990s.
Fritz Pollard died on May 11, 1986 in Silver Springs, MD.

02/05/2025

In 1875, Oliver Lewis became the first jockey to win the Kentucky Derby, America''s longest continuous sporting event. Lewis was born in 1856 in Fayette Country, Kentucky, to his parents Goodson and Eleanor Lewis. Lewis was born free, but there is little known about his parents or family. Lewis was only 19 years old when he entered the first Kentucky Derby. The race was held at what was then the Louisville Jockey Club on May 17, 1875, but is now known as Churchill Downs.Ten thousand spectators watched this first race. Lewis rode a horse named Aristide, which was one of two colts entered by their owner, H. Price McGrath of Jessamine, Kentucky. The other horse, Chesapeake, was ridden by William Henry. Although the same owner entered both horses, Chesapeake was favored to win the $2,850 purse, and Lewis was told that his job was to lead most of the race to tire out the other horses. Out of the fifteen jockeys in the field, at this first Kentucky Derby, thirteen of them were African American. Aristide''s trainer, Ansel Williamson, was also an African American.Oliver Lewis followed his instructions and was pushing most of the field while trailing a horse named Volcano for most of the race. However, in the last stretch, Chesapeake was unexpectedly far back in the pack, while Aristide and Volcano were running neck and neck for first place. Lewis and Aristide pulled away near the finish line and won the race by two lengths. With that victory, Lewis became the first jockey to win the Kentucky Derby. Later that season, Lewis came in second in the Belmont Stakes in New York and won three more races at the Louisville Jockey Club, riding Aristide in all of them. He would never ride in the Kentucky Derby again, however, and would retire after that racing season for unknown reasons.After retiring, Lewis worked for a short time as a day laborer, but then began providing handicapping tables and racing forms to bookies. He later became a bookie himself, which was legal in Kentucky at that time. Lewis married, although his wife''s name is unknown. The couple had six children, including James, who inherited his lucrative bookmaking business. Oliver Lewis died in Lexington, Kentucky, in 1924 at the age of 68.